[Arising chiefly from combinations in COUNTER- (esp. in senses 6, 9), with subsequent extension to more or less analogous instances, e.g., counter-current, counter current, the currents are counter. In many cases it is not possible to draw any line of demarcation between counter adj., and counter- pref.: see under the latter.] Acting in opposition; lying or tending in the opposite direction; having an opposite tendency, to the opposite effect; opposed, opposite: cf. senses of COUNTER- pref. Mostly attrib.
1596. Spenser, F. Q., VI. xii. 1. A ship … met of many a counter winde and tyde.
1662. Evelyn, Chalcogr., 118. The Sensation of Relievo … by one, or more hatches, cross and counter.
1780. Ld. Stirling, in Sparks, Corr. Amer. Rev. (1853), III. 5. He might, in case the enemy retired, send them counter orders.
1836–7. Sir W. Hamilton, Metaph., xii. (1870), 218. The counter doctrine is self-repugnant.
1842. Tennyson, Gold. Year, 7. We crost Between the lakes, and clamber’d half way up The counter side.
1844. Bp. Wilberforce, Amer. Ch. (1846), 161. Having founded a counter episcopate.
1847. De Quincey, Secret Soc., Wks. (1863), VI. 305. The answer is found precisely in the parallel case of the counter sect. Ibid. (1857), Wks. (1871), XVI. 238, note. In one direction … and in the counter direction.
1864. Tennyson, Aylmer’s Field, 282. Withdrawing by the counter door to that Which Leolin open’d.
1879. Farrar, St. Paul, II. 447. To combat false doctrine … by the presentation of the counter truth.
b. Duplicate; serving as a check (see COUNTER- 8).
1823. Southey, Hist. Penins. War, I. 112. The magistrate … was to deliver in a list of all the owners of fishing boats … a counter list was to be kept on board the floating battery.
c. Rarely predicative: Opposite, contrary.
1856. Emerson, Eng. Traits, iv. Race, Wks. (Bohn), II. 22. The currents of thought are counter.
